Japanese macaques at hot spring sites demonstrate remarkable thermoregulatory behavior that has become iconic, but tourism pressure at these sites creates welfare challenges.
Jigokudani macaque welfare illustrates the tension between wildlife tourism economic benefits and the welfare of habituated wildlife. Hot spring bathing is a welfare-positive behavior — macaques that bathe show reduced cold-stress indicators — but the tourist infrastructure built around observing this behavior creates its own welfare costs through disturbance, crowding, and altered social dynamics. Social hierarchy shapes access to the hot springs: high-ranking females bathe more and for longer periods, while subordinate animals are displaced and receive fewer thermal benefits. Tourism management that maintains minimum approach distances, prohibits flash photography, prohibits feeding, and limits visitor numbers per session protects the welfare basis of the very behavior that makes the site worth visiting.